


Magic Mark and the Deal

by roseveare



Category: Haven (TV)
Genre: Canon Divergence, M/M, Season/Series 01, Verging on crackfic, magic cock Trouble, mystery guest character cameo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-16
Updated: 2017-05-16
Packaged: 2018-11-01 14:15:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10923507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/roseveare/pseuds/roseveare
Summary: Nathan agrees to have sex with a Troubled stranger because he'll feel it. Duke doesn't take it well. Nathan/OMC, Duke/Nathan, Audrey.





	Magic Mark and the Deal

**Author's Note:**

> One from the edit pile. I have no idea where this came from but the first draft was written in a single 24 hour period when I was supposed to be doing NaNoWriMo (2015).

"You're not going to believe this," Audrey said, walking into their shared office.

Nathan folded his arms and leaned back. "I don't know, think I'm getting a handle on these cases by now. Hit me."

She tipped her head. "Nothing exploding yet, or falling from the sky... but word is there's a guy in town going around spouting an offer to _take people's curses away_."

It caught him unprepared. The air hissed too loud through his teeth and rasped as it left his throat.

"It didn't last," Parker said, too quickly. "Nathan, it didn't last more than a few hours. But... some people will take that. Vicki said she spent two hours last night drawing again." Her smile went steely. "Vicky also went bright red and wouldn't tell me a single thing about the secret method this guy 'Mark' uses to remove Troubles, but I'm thinking that tells us something itself."

Nathan, having damped his flare of hope down, blinked and asked.,"You're thinking exactly what?"

Audrey shook her head and smirked, amusement returning hesitantly after her rise of concern. "I'm thinking nothing. Except that we need to find this guy, question him, and figure this out."

"If Vicki was drawing, _normally_ drawing," Nathan said, leaning forward, "then it works."

"That's kind of what's worrying me," Audrey admitted. "If he was a fake, it wouldn't matter nearly so much. Right?"

Nathan stood up. It had to be psychosomatic, the way his chest felt light and weak, like his heart was fluttering inside his rib cage, nervous and rattled. When he held the door to let them both out, he didn't move his hand back in time to prevent Audrey's hand brushing it skin against skin. The accidental sensation jolted through him like a lightning bolt.

She noticed something of his reaction and paused. "Nathan? Are you all right?" He pulled his hand back and folded both arms behind him, safely away from hers reaching for him in automatic concern.

"Fine. I'm fine, Parker."

"Okay..." She drew out the word with a hint of sarcasm. "Well. Let's find out who Mark is and how his thing works and what his intentions are before you get too many hopes about his solution. Deal?"

Nathan frowned. "I wasn't thinking of-- I _wasn't_."

He looked from her hands to the smile on her soft lips. He was going to have to tell her _sometime_ ; come clean about the fact he could feel her. But he didn't know how. She was his friend and partner, and it wasn't even remotely appropriate to be pining for her touch. Not only that, but because she _was_ his friend, and far closer to him than the others they'd dealt with, he hated the thought of telling her that she wasn't normal, either. But... had to be something going on with her to let him feel her, after all. It meant she was like him: some other kind of freak.

"Hey," Audrey cajoled. "If it _works_ , and you want to do it, why the hell not? I'll back you. Sometimes I guess we could all use the chance to be free of our inbuilt restrictions for an hour or two."

He shook his head and forced a smile. "Not what I'm thinking of. Let's go find out what his deal is."

They ran into Duke practically the other side of the office door. He cast his eyes up and down Nathan, and apparently judging his mood to be below-par for the usual greeting jibe, moved on and spoke to Audrey. "Hey. You know Mrs Biskey, with the vampire thing? Allergy-to-sunlight, doesn't-show-up-in-mirrors? That whole shtick?"

Nathan nodded along with his partner. It was hard to forget the unlucky geriatric bearer of a vampire Trouble. Fortunately, the part about sucking blood either seemed to be a myth or was confounded by a lack of any remaining teeth.

"She greeted me in sunlight, in full view in her garden, this morning." Duke shook his head incredulously. "Waxed all lyrical about watching the dawn. And I'm _pretty_ sure I could see her in my wing mirror as I drove away."

"Mm," Audrey responded, casting a knowing look back to Nathan. "Well, Vicki wouldn't give me any details, but perhaps Mrs Biskey will. That sounds as good a place as any to start."

"Start what?" Duke asked, and Nathan groaned internally as he fell in upon their heels, and realising as Audrey cheerfully began to fill in the detail of their case that she was going to accept the presence of their irritating third wheel for this, too. Considering what was at stake... no vampire puns intended... Nathan particularly didn't want Duke hanging around on this one.

Not because he was thinking of making a deal with the man who took Troubles away... and they now had evidence for his ability working at least twice. No, it would be foolish to contemplate it. They had to find out a lot more information before he could begin to entertain such a possibility. He just wanted to keep his options open.

"You don't actually have to come with us," Nathan jabbed. "We can phone to update your neighbourly curiosity. Although... no, _that's_ not the job of the police, either."

"He can check out this lead with us," Audrey said. "It's not exactly police work, either, Nathan."

Duke shot him a smug look and a showy shrug, and Nathan rolled his eyes and internally fumed. 

It didn't seem like making much of it was going to win him anything, though. Better if he played it down, and maybe Duke wouldn't get scent of the conflict behind his frustration but would lose interest and wander off.

***

One day he was probably going to have to admit to someone that, so long as no-one was actually _bleeding_ or _dying_ , there were occasions when the thought of weirdness going on put a spring in his step at the excuse to go hang with his two cops -- well: to pester Nathan, and to hang with Audrey.

Nathan was acting weird even for Nathan, but Duke wasn't sure if that was plain old got-out-of-the-wrong-side-of-bed, a mistake which it seemed Nathan made every day upon waking, or something significant.

By the time they got to Mrs Biskey's place, the old lady was nowhere in sight, some of the tools had been left out in the garden, and when they tried knocking they got a quiet hiss of, "You know I can't come out in daylight! I need to go back to sleep now." 

"It only lasts a few hours," Nathan reiterated to Duke. He walked around and picked up the tools from the yard, putting then into a tidy pile next to her front door, and after a few seconds, Duke joined in.

"Okay, so no luck with Mrs Biskey, but Vince's tip this morning said the guy had paid a visit to Oliver Stacket at the electrics store and Mary Cole, who works as a barista in the cafe," Audrey said, as Nathan started the Bronco.

Duke leaned over both their shoulders from the back seat. "That's great, I needed to talk to Oliver anyway about ordering in a couple of components for the boat." 

Oliver they found flushed and stuttery in his standard dungarees, and smelling sweetly of aftershave as he _never_ had before. His thin, young face had a shyer smile than Duke had ever noticed, and he couldn't help but detect that it was directed quite keenly -- to Nathan, at first, and then upon failing to have any impact upon the _wall_ that was Nathan's expression, at Duke. Who smiled back and thought about this clean-shaven-ness and prettied-up-ness in a man who'd never bothered before in his life. Oliver had been at school a few years below Duke and Nathan, and had always been kind of a nerd. Got a lot of flack generally, never had a girlfriend that Duke knew about. 

"Oh, well, he... yeah. It lasted for a few hours. He took my Trouble away all right!" Oliver said, cheerfully and too loud. "I can't... can't tell you how, though, I mean, it's a secret, right? He swore me to secrecy, so I couldn't tell you. Wouldn't be right to do that." He was blushing fiercer the more he gabbled. Duke blinked a whole lot.

"You won't get any sense outta him," said Jean, the scary old harridan who owned the store. "He's been useless since yesterday. Won't spit it out why, neither."

Audrey dragged them out of the establishment, cutting short Nathan's obliviousness and Duke's goggling. "Is it my imagination, or was that guy trying to pull?" she posed, narrowing her eyes intently at Nathan, and then at Duke in particular.

"It's _definitely_ not just my imagination that the guy has gotten some in some big, life-changing way recently," Duke said, smirking.

"Vicki was all blushes and no answers, too," Audrey said, sourly. "The guy who takes Troubles away, you _don't_ think he's--?"

Duke choked, and held his stomach and creased over, bowled by the absurdity of it. "Oh, please, _please_ let this be a Magic Cock Trouble..."

Nathan scowled at them both, although perhaps he looked more alarmed than outraged. "He's _not_ having sex with them. Not even in Haven. Not even the Troubles--"

Audrey patted his arm. "Let's go to Mary Cole, and see what she has to say."

Duke frowned at Nathan, who looked rather too scandalized, and hell, Nathan was a stiff -- maybe a bit shy -- but he wasn't a prude, exactly, and so it didn't make sense that he should be so...

Then it hit him. Like a punch. _Aw, Nathan..._ "Oh, _wow_. I guess this is one temporary fix you won't be taking. Talk about compromising positions for an officer of the law." Okay, that... was downright shitty, because of course Nathan would have jumped at a chance to lose his Trouble. Prostituting himself for that chance would definitely not be on Detective Wuornos' agenda.

The attempt to inject sympathy gained him nothing, Nathan still scowled like he'd said something awful and even animated himself enough to jab a finger -- not _quite_ in Duke's face, but with scary vehemence -- and grit to Audrey, "Remind me why he's here."

She tipped her head and grinned winsomely as she drawled, "Because he feeds me cappuccinos and dirty martinis on the house and we can all use lessons on infinite patience, Wuornos?"

"Am I being defended or insulted?" Duke did a double-take, looking between them, not feeling overly defended.

"We need to find this... Magic Mark," Nathan said, impatiently. The radio set clipped to his belt burped and he reached for it distractedly, scoring it on the second try. "What is it, Laverne?"

"He's staying at Mallory's B&B," Laverne chirped with infinitely good cheer. "I met with the ladies on morning break and he was the _only_ subject of discussion. Your perp's a fine-looking young man. Cassie had photographic proof of that much on her phone."

"We have no actual proof he's done anything illegal yet!" Audrey called, standing on her tiptoes to get the message through the receiver.

Nathan mustered words from his aimlessly moving jaw after several seconds. "...Thanks, Laverne." His eyes darted warily to Audrey as he cut the communication. "She _didn't_..."

Audrey laughed. "Laverne isn't Troubled. But judging by that naughty giggle in her voice, one of her gossip crowd is and spilled the dirt in intimate detail. C'mon, Wuornos, we've got all the pieces. We know _exactly_ what's going on."

Nathan shook his head disgustedly and turned his back to stalk to the Bronco while Audrey and Duke exchanged amused looks. "Come on, it is a _little_ funny," she cajoled, heading after him with a bounce in her step. It got bouncier after her phone buzzed and she checked the screen. "Oh! Laverne sent the pic. She's not exaggerating."

Duke got his look in first while Nathan was mainlining the approach of _ignore, ignore_. "Damn. You think you might develop a sudden-onset Trouble, Officer Parker? I might consider it myself."

"I'm not ruling it out."

Nathan was notably set-jawed, narrow-eyed and _silent_ \-- not that the last in particular was notable from him -- as they got into his car.

***

"Hey!" Duke grabbed and pointing, hanging onto the back of Nathan's seat. "That... that's the _guy_!" He jabbed his hand past Nathan's face toward the man they were just coming up on, making his way slowly down the sidewalk. "The guy from the phone. Mr Photogenic. Magic Mark!"

Nathan had been aware of his movements in his peripheral vision. Lucky he didn't jolt and bury them in a lamp post when Duke's hand shot past his ear. He whipped his head around to swear at Duke as he braked, the Bronco squealing with the fast stop, then gave up. He had more on his mind than Duke.

He kicked the door open and decamped from the car. Several long strides took him to the guy. "Excuse me--" Setting his hand lightly on the man's shoulder when he didn't turn around at once.

Nathan had been... _embarrassed_... to display interest in the photograph on Audrey's cellphone. He'd had enough of a cursory glance for future identification purposes, and kept his thoughts deliberately blank about the rest. But there was... a _something_. An undeniable _spark_ at first sight of the man's good looking, smooth-featured face, unlined except for dimples and smile-lines artfully placed by nature. He had dark hair, neatly styled, and he looked out from an inch or so below Nathan's own eye level through very warm brown eyes that were reminiscent, for a moment, of _Duke_. Of all people.

Yeah. Duke could be a charming slimeball, too, Nathan thought sourly, analysing that association on the spot.

There was something peculiarly bright and eager in the manner Mark's eyes slid up and down Nathan before supplying a slightly breathy, "Hello?"

"Police." The guy's eyes only brightened further when Nathan held up his badge. "Want to ask a few questions. If it's no trouble." Intent emphasis on the latter.

"No trouble at _all_ , officer." The fast reponse was a long way too eager.

" _Detective_ ," Nathan corrected gruffly, and that had probably been too sharp. "Wuornos. Detective Wuornos." He made efforts to recover professionalism, but their Trouble suspect was making no secret of _checking him out_.

Duke, in the background, was clinging to Nathan's car and caught between laughing and choking. Audrey's eyebrows were cutely raised as she stepped up beside Nathan, waving her own badge. "Officer Parker. While we're all about the introductions, would your name happen to be Mark?"

"Mark Markham," the guy contributed, his smile taking on a different character.

"Hah--" Audrey squashed a laugh at the obvious fake identity. "I'd have a bone to pick with my parents about that one."

Mark tipped his head. "My mother remarried."

"...Okay. You've been making waves around town, Mr Markham."

Mark looked politely baffled.

"It's a small town," added Nathan.

"I don't know what you mean..." A laugh in his voice, Mark held his arms out. "But if I did, I might say that it's not illegal to have fun."

"We... haven't finished compiling the list of your 'conquests'," Audrey said, chirpily, as if she was _trying_ to make Nathan cringe. "I'll be frank... Can you take people's Troubles away? And despite how that sounds, I do mean it in a completely non-metaphorical sense."

Mark's eyes travelled levelly over them and his body curled like a cat. He leaned back against the fence of someone's well cared-for yard, hiking his perfectly rounded, well-exercised buttocks over the top of the posts to prop himself. An undeniable grace inhabited his movements. Laverne's gossip club were right, damn them. It wasn't supernatural, wasn't Troubles, this. Just a core physical attractiveness, hard to define but very much present.

"All right, you got me," Mark said easily, after enough hesitation to tell how carefully he was gauging his answer. "You going to arrest me for that? Arrest a guy for doing a few favours for some of his fellow citizens?"

"Favours," snerked Duke. "More like _sexual_ fav--"

"Don't." Audrey raised a hand warningly, though she was still smiling. Nathan cast a narrow gaze between Duke and Mark and kind of felt like he was seeing double. Scoundrels, both.

Mark stepped closer -- stepped, unexpectedly, right into Nathan's space -- and Nathan looked down to find fingers plucked at his shirt, pulling a stretch of it outward as if to tug him in. "I could help _you_ with your Trouble, officer... _Detective_ ," he self-corrected.

Nathan's heart _jerked_ in his chest, and he felt the lurch even with his Trouble intact. "How did you--?"

Duke was well and truly buried under that coughing fit of his in the background now. Nathan couldn't feel his own face flush, but he'd just bet that Duke had never, ever been so amused.

"You're not _secret_..." And that was distinctly a come-on voice, spoken almost at the same time as Audrey's sharp, " _I don't think that's an appropriate suggestion, mister_!" 

"What do you say, Detective?" Fingers twisting in his shirt, travelling lower. Why were his hands still at his sides? Nathan had made no effort to remove, to _stop_ that... "What would you do for a few hours without that Trouble of _yours_?"

" _Hey_!" Audrey put in, louder. "He's not going to do anything. Stop _pawing_ at him, or I'll arrest you for assault on an officer!"

"Hey, now..." Mark acted only amused at Audrey's suggestion.

The world seemed to sway and twist around him. Nathan swallowed hard, and thought about all the things he'd been trying _not_ to think about, that he'd been thinking about when this case first came up. 

__

_Pity that Duke had to be here, on hand..._ He couldn't do anything about this while Duke was here to witness, could he? He'd never hear the end of it... The last person he'd want to bear witness to him commit something monumentally stupid in return for a break from his Trouble was Duke Crocker.

The thoughts seemed very distant. Nathan was aware of himself thinking, but his own reason seemed completely disconnected from his consciousness. 

"...Yeah." Nathan shook himself out of his frozen stupor. The word on his lips came of its own accord, although his voice sounded hoarse. "Yeah... okay."

***

Duke averted his eyes, cringing from the scene and honestly not daring to look, but sensed abrupt movement in his peripheral vision... and in that moment he hoped like hell that Nathan _hadn't_ gone after the guy. That he'd look up, and he'd see Nathan still standing in front of him, developing that pissed-off crease between his eyebrows at what that _fucking sleaze_ had just so blatantly offered, and...

Then, he made himself look up, and Nathan was haring after the sleaze like that was the best offer he'd had _all_ _year_. Duke literally could not believe it. He spent several seconds checking his own perceptions and wondering what kind of illusion Trouble was at work. Because that, what he was seeing, didn't make any sense at all.

"You are _kidding_ ," Duke hissed under his breath, fighting against a throat that apparently wanted to close up and choke him. "Nathan!" He dredged out a mangled shout as he prepared to break into a run to follow.

Audrey grabbed his arm. She didn't look _happy_ \-- she looked about as stunned and deeply concerned as he felt -- but her fingers dug in hard. "Don't. It's his choice."

"He's making a mistake."

Audrey laughed, bitterly. "But it's _his_ mistake to make. Duke, we're not the... the keepers of his virtue, and it's _his choice_. None of the others were influenced, the Trouble doesn't work like that. If they said no, Mark just left them alone. We can't _tell_ Nathan who he should and shouldn't sleep with. It's not ours to do."

"A _huge_ mistake," Duke amended, fervently. "And as far as I can see, no sleeping involved! Audrey! We don't know this guy from -- I mean, _what_ , he just shows up in town, preaches 'I can cure your Troubles...' far and wide... 'Oh, hello, Mr. Sexy Detective, let me cure _your_ Trouble _and sexually pleasure you_ '. We are seriously going to accept this?"

Audrey choked a bit then rallied with a quirky, if harried, lift of her eyebrows and asked, "You think Nathan's sexy, huh?"

"Who doesn't?" Duke shrugged. Nathan and the guy were both out of sight around the corner. Duke flopped bonelessly against the side of Nathan's abandoned truck. "The point _is_ , our friend just got propositioned by a stranger, who has some serious leverage and all kind of advantage. Nate might as well be drunk insensible, the amount of actual thinking consent involved in this decision! We have to go get him--"

Audrey snapped, " _Duke_. Nathan is a grown up, and we can not stop him doing this. We both already _told him_ where we stand on this, and he does not care. And hell, no, I didn't know he was wired that way either, but if he wants to have sex with a man he's just met, that's absolutely his decision."

"He's not wired that way, Audrey! He's just so _freakin'_ desperate for touch, any touch, that--" He stopped because Audrey was giving him a very narrow look, and shutting his mouth seemed like it would be the best idea, lest she figure out that Duke knew Nathan wasn't wired that way because of the amount of times he'd-- Well. Duke had spent his whole life basically trying to come onto Nathan, both subtly and not so subtly because Nathan often needed to be beat over the head with an idea where social interactions, and particularly social _attractions,_ were concerned.

Now this dick who didn't even know him was going to get all the goods, and it made Duke sick to his stomach. Actually, that wasn't the only sickening aspect about this… Duke really hoped that this wasn't the usual or at least only way the guy did his thing: he seriously didn't want to think about Mrs. Biskey having sex with anything, and that was a really twisted way to extort an old woman.

"I guess," Duke said sourly, dragging himself to look back at Audrey again, "that he's going to come back and claim this was 'investigating'. Following up the case. All in the line of duty."

Audrey's eyes glinted, a touch of disapproval in that return gaze. "You never know, Duke. Maybe he'll _enjoy it_. You're the one who's always telling him that he needs to get laid."

Duke facepalmed. He didn't need to be strung up with his own words. He'd always kind of meant, besides, that Nathan needed to get laid _with him_.

***

This should have been awkward -- had been _hugely_ awkward at first, when he'd followed the guy into his homey B &B, sly glances directed back at Nathan all the way inside and up the stairs -- but since they'd started to touch, the sensations had begun to slowly creep back into his numb skin, and there was quickly little Nathan's mind cared to entertain except for those. He lost track of his concerns about them making too much noise, or doing this in the daytime, or making a mess of the pale peach bedset of the Seaview Guest House. 

_Audrey_ could get past his Trouble, he'd discovered only weeks ago, and it had been half killing him ever since. He could never do this with Audrey, his partner, his friend. But with a stranger, someone he had no relationship with, where there were no expectations... someone just passing through who didn't even live in town?

He shivered as Mark's touch crept down his spine, in the form of flattened palms and in their centre the warm wetness of a mouth. He didn't entirely expect the sensation to travel lower when it reached his buttocks, but the hands squeezed and palmed out while the wetness of the mouth travelled down the crack of his ass. Nathan clawed fistfuls of the top cover and almost jerked both of them off the bed, at the novelty of a sensation he'd never felt even _when_ he could feel. They'd both showered before they did this, which had seemed fair, though the other guy was even more critical about how completely Nathan washed than he'd cared to think about in return. Now he had the other man's tongue up his ass, that... well, the insistence on absolute cleanliness made sense.

He whimpered into the sheets as Mark opened him up. Although he _hadn't_ done anything before with a man, he'd watched all sorts of pornography trying to break through the isolating sense of impotence that had come along with his Trouble, and what he'd physically agreed to wasn't a mystery to him.

The intensity of the movements of the strong muscle of Mark's tongue lapping and pushing in and out of him ebbed and flowed, building. Nathan whined in abrupt discomfort. "Stop... _stop_ ," he groaned, and rolled away as Mar's face retreated. Nathan tucked himself against the pillows at the top of the bed and buried his hands in his hair, breathing hard. He could feel that, too, now, even without Mark's hand on him. Could feel the intensity of sensation between his legs, the heat and pressure in his cock.

Mark's brows crunched as he crawled over and perched on the end of the bed. "What's the matter? Don't tell me you're tired already?"

"Just need a minute." Nathan sat there and breathed, and honestly, as sensation went, the bedclothes underneath his body and the slight chill of the room temperature air against his bare skin was _enough_. His cock was hard, red and weeping with the ferocity of his arousal, and there was some pain from the tightness of his balls. He thought it was probably just as well he'd taken the break.

"I guess this is definitely more than you're used to," Mark said. Nathan looked again at his dark hair, bushy eyebrows and clean-shaven, pleasant face, his catalogue model good looks. But Nathan didn't know him; his looks didn't make this mean any more, except for easing the mechanics of basic arousal.

After Nathan had waited for things to subside again to 'bearable', Mark crawled forward between his stretched out legs. "Can I touch you again?" 

He waited for Nathan's answer before putting his hand on a splayed ankle. His hands smoothed their ways up Nathan's legs, and Nathan collapsed back against the pillows and twisted his hands through the bedclothes into the harder surface of the mattress and savoured the feeling of that pressure between his fingers as much as the rest. He groaned as Mark reached his cock.

He'd seen the porn, but it was still like watching a bizarre magic trick as he watched Mark make all of that hard, red shaft disappear gradually between his lips.

Mark's mouth felt like the best place Nathan's cock had ever been, and it was almost impossible to resist jerking his hips, trying to find more friction. Mark's cheeks hollowed around him and his hands dug into Nathan's buttocks. 

"Stop, I'm..." Nathan tried to warn, suddenly, tugging at Mark's hair. But the other man sped up, guzzled harder, and pushed his chin into Nathan's aching balls. He couldn't hold back any longer. Mark drank him down greedily, though, as if that was what he'd wanted all along. Nathan felt boneless as Mark's mouth finally slipped off him, and evaded the other man's gaze guiltily. 

"It's no problem," Mark said, offering another encouraging smile. "Return me the favour a while, and I don't reckon it'll be long before you're back up for more, the way your body _needs_ this."

"Mm." He was on less certain territory there, especially when his brain felt all used up, far too numb to contemplate learning new skills. But Mark was relaxing back against the pillows, opening his legs wide in invitation, and Nathan did _want_ to reciprocate. Wasn't planning to let this be one-sided.

He crawled between Mark's legs and tentatively licked the head of his erection. It didn't seem so large or fierce as his own had been, but as Nathan worked it swelled further, and it was daunting, even as it carried a thrill of excitement to think about where it was heading after this.

His Trouble was wandering around a level something less than full feeling, after the break from Mark's touch, and had it been fully gone, he didn't think he could have taken Mark so far into his own mouth as he eventually did, though he still couldn't manage to equal the other man's feat. 

"Can I move your head?" Mark asked. "I'm thinking it might be easier to _show_ you how to do this."

"Uh-hn," Nathan agreed, feeling a little mortified about having to need a lesson. He endured Mark's hands easing his head forward, achieving a deeper penetration than Nathan had dared attempt on his own, although he wasn't rough and didn't insist on maintaining it for long. Nathan felt fluid at the back of his tongue, and Mark was gasping even as he withdrew, still hard and dribbling a little precum as he held himself at the root. Nathan was hard again already, as predicted.

"God," Mark said. "Now I wish I'd done more prep earlier. Well... we still need to do that, so come on." He pulled at Nathan's body.

"On my back," Nathan said, a bit curtly. He wasn't thrilled by the seeming passiveness of presenting his ass to be fucked, no matter what he'd agreed, especially not after the way Mark had taken over the attempt to give his first blow job.

"For now." Mark grabbed something from the nightstand and rolled over, climbing up Nathan's body. There was a squelch of something being squeezed from a tube. Mark's hand pushed down on Nathan's chest, his weight rolling him back, and the second hand crept between his legs.

He almost bucked as the finger slid into his ass, but managed to hold himself still. He stretched his neck back and breathed harshly, fixing his attention on the wall above him, the ugly pictures, the textured wallpaper, as the intensity of sensation all but robbed him of control of his lower body. Two fingers in his ass, now, flexing, rubbing, parting. He made a raw noise. Mark chuckled at him. 

"Damn, you're responsive. I guess that Trouble really sucks."

"Yeah," Nathan agreed, heavily, breathily. He wheezed as a third finger was added and he felt something inside him opening, relaxing and expanding. The insistent entry of Mark's pushing fingers got easier, but he kept going, rubbing and massaging all around the opening. Nathan felt his hole squirm and try to flex helplessly under the assault and bore back with a thin moan, wanting more than that, wanting it all..

"Sorry, you're gonna have to roll over," Mark said. Nathan felt the hand retreat, then both Mark's hands were pushing at his sides. He gave up and let his body be moved around, wanting the fullness and sensation _back_. "It's too weird face to face. I mean, for you too, right? It _isn't_ like this is a romantic liaison."

"Guess not," Nathan agreed, restless with the thought he'd still have preferred it the other way. Too much like bending over and being used, he figured; wasn't sure as a novice at the experience how to make himself feel more an active participant. He'd agreed to this as a release, he reminded himself -- intended it as nothing more, been fully aware that what the _other_ guy got out of the deal wasn't in any way altruistic. Nathan _needed_ to do this, and the other people Mark had approached were perfectly happy about the deal they'd made and the time they'd gained free of their Troubles. "You fuh-- You f-fuck all of them?" Despite his resolve, he found himself stammering at the awkwardness of it, on his knees feeling the bare skin of his ass kissed by the whisper of air moving over it.

Mark laughed. "Only the special ones. Don't worry."

"'Special' meaning?"

"The ones I _want to_." 

"How'd you -- how d'you do it with the others?" Nathan gasped out, arms curling in the sheets, arching his back as he felt Mark's weight settle over him. Very heated flesh brushed the back of his thighs, between his legs, the underside of his balls and the shaft of his own jutting cock.

"Would you believe it's all down to body fluids?" Mark said, a trace unfocused. His hand moved between their bodies, arranging. Nathan felt the head of the other man's cock against his hole; felt it pushing inward slowly. "Consumption. Exchange. This is definitely the fun way. Though it depends on the... recipient..."

Searing _presence_ cut a path through Nathan's lower body, leaving him with his mouth wide and his braced hands and knees frozen holding his weight. Breath wouldn't come, though he gulped for it. Realised he was swallowing the air rather than breathing it. Mark pushed the last half-inch or so inside and stopped, stroking Nathan's hips with both hands, breathing audibly. "How is that? Good? Too much? Give it a moment..."

Nathan jerked his head wordlessly in a nod, sensation-overloaded. For over two years he'd had _nothing_. This... he felt debauched, and honestly part of him felt pretty lousy about doing this, but he still wanted it, _needed_ it, and he managed to draw in a shuddering breath as Mark pulled back a short way. Though he almost lost it as the next thrust drove home.

The intensity was -- he felt like he was going to lose his _mind_. He hissed as Mark took note of his acceptance and continued to move, starting to create a rhythm. At first the tight passage of his ass seemed to hold and drag with each thrust, trying to resist Mark's cock, but as he continued, the slick of fluids and the stretch of the skin created a suction that seemed to pull Mark back in each time he withdrew, as if Nathan's body was eager to be fucked. He groaned and made incoherent noises, and he'd come already, pretty quick after those first few tight penetrations and tugging withdrawals, but he didn't care. His cock was still dribbling, still trying as it slackened. The B &B's pastel coloured bed sheets were going to be a mess.

There was an element of discomfort starting to creep in, though his body was still working things out and it wasn't easy to pick up anything other than the overwhelming whole of the sensation, which had been _too much_ from the start, if he'd bothered to think about it. But his ass was starting to feel sore, and there was a distracting ache deep in his genitals. Nathan's brain started to come back online.

"You," he mumbled, and choked out through his teeth as Mark pushed in deep again, and the sensation was still -- _God_. "You mean we could have, what, licked each other's sweat, instead? But you pitched this deal."

"Need more'n that," Mark grunted. "Usually blood. Never tried urine." Nathan felt the shudder of the other man's revulsion through his buttocks and back. "This... this is best. Not regretting it, are you?"

Nathan hissed at another thrust laid over friction-sore skin. He wasn't used to this activity, but judging from his displayed staying power, Mark was. "No..." He didn't _regret_. If he'd had someone in his life, it might've been a different matter. He'd have wanted to be doing this with _them_ in the lingering aftermath of Mark drinking his blood. But having no-one, this had been better than spending time with his hand. There were things he had to exorcise from his system. He needed another person to do that.

\--And it was finished, now, as Mark sank deep and came, hips pushing down, unbalancing Nathan with the sudden more desperate force of the last thrust and sending him to one elbow. He felt the fluid release push past the obstruction of Mark's cock to leak back down his ass, and that was... He pressed his hand against his mouth, overwhelmed in a new way. 

He hadn't been certain before, but now he was pretty damn sure that his sexual orientation could happily encompass being with a man, _beyond_ the need for him to feel another body entwined against his after years of nothing.

Mark pulled fully out, the oddest sensation. Nathan's ass twitched and adjusted and generally re-accustomed itself to existence without the constant advance and retreat, to contend with. Mark groaned in satisfaction and Nathan collapsed on the bed. Mark climbed up to the pillows and collapsed next to him, a stray hand over his ribs. It didn't seem affectionate so much as possessive, and Nathan slid his own hand on top of it and, without making too much of a show over it, disengaged it, held it for a moment, then moved it firmly away.

"I don't usually do this," Mark said, "but if you want to stay a while, we can go again."

"No," said Nathan. Wasn't a tough decision. He stared into the pillows. His body was alive, satisfied -- _done_ , but singing at him. Maybe he wasn't proud of what he'd done to get that, but he was appreciating it all the same. "I'm supposed to be on duty. I guess I'm calling this an early lunch break."

Mark snorted. "Man, I can't believe I just did it with a cop."

Nathan scowled. Not the best reminder. "It's a one-off. Done deal." He rolled off the bed. His ass yelled at him, making him misstep.

"Yeah, sure. You've got about an hour and a half." Mark sketched a lazy wave as Nathan reached for his clothes. "You can use the shower again if you want." 

Nathan didn't particularly want to linger in Mark's room, but he didn't want to go back to Audrey's and -- damn it! -- Duke's company smelling like sex with Mark. He took the shower. Turned out to be a good plan, anyway. The water running over his skin was almost as good as a rekindling of sexual sensation. When he came out, Mark was still floating in his post-sex haze on the bed.

"I'll see you," Nathan said, and added, "We're still looking into this, don't forget."

Mark laughed at him, which was a reaction he supposed in all fairness he was due.

***

Outside the B&B, they caught up with a Nathan who smelled of shower gel and had slightly fluffy hair. Even those small signs, absent as they were of any great indication of wild debauchery, made Duke feel sickened. It seemed Nathan had been kicking his heels caressing the wall or the flower beds ever since he'd rang Audrey to bring the Bronco and pick him up. He didn't look like a guy who'd just got laid and got a reprieve from his shitty Trouble, though. He looked pensive and focused and unhappy. He shot a glower at Duke like he was expecting him to say something, but honestly, Duke had no words. He shrugged and spread his hands instead, but Nathan took that badly anyway and glowered all the more intently as he swapped places with Audrey in the front of the truck. He slammed the door.

"Nathan?" Audrey ventured, climbing back in. "Are you all right? Or do I have to go in and arrest him for... something I will pretend I did not make up on the spot but will nonetheless make sure _sticks_?"

"I'm okay," Nathan said crossly. "I'm fine. It was an... exchange. I don't want to hear about it again. I don't want _anyone else_ to hear about it again." He directed his scowl at Duke. Then he pulled in a breath that shivered and flexed his hands on the wheel, without starting the truck. "Blood. He normally uses blood. He drinks theirs, they drink his. Sex... sexual fluids work the same way. Says he hasn't tried anything else."

Duke put two and two together with a surge of irrational rage. "You mean he could have done this the _other_... disgusting but far less invasive way and instead he--?"

"I didn't want to drink his _blood_ , Duke," Nathan growled, which was pretty telling, and Duke blinked quite a lot. Talk about nailing your colours to the mast... "Now, let's get back to the station. I need a coffee. Something to eat..."

"Heavy expenditure of the calories, huh?" Duke asked.

"Leave him alone, Duke," Audrey warned. "We'll swing by the sandwich shop on the way."

"Say, but you can _feel_ right now, can't you?" Duke protested, and poked the back of Nathan's neck with his fingertip. 

Nathan flailed a hand back and caught his breath sharply; shifted in the seat in a fashion that seemed to indicate most of what he was feeling was a sore ass. "Yeah."

... _Fuck_. Duke hated this. he hated that someone else -- who didn't give a damn about Nathan, didn't even _know him_ \-- had _been there_ , and he was seeing the evidence of that. Someone who was just using people's weakness and needs against them to get his end away. He didn't believe Nathan Wuornos had _fallen_ for that crap. The laws of the universe had all flipped on him or something.

"You enjoyed it?" Duke's mouth apparently had a mind of its own. "The process of getting there, you enjoyed it, right? Because if that guy--" He hadn't meant to ask that, in the least, and from the way Nathan was choking he couldn't believe Duke had asked, but seriously, he felt like he could _explode_ , and...

"Duke!" Audrey exclaimed. "What the -- you sound like you're actually ready to go pound this guy if he didn't play nice... Do you _know_ what you sound like?"

Like some possessive caveman out to defend Nathan's delicate virtue, according to Audrey's tone. "He's my _friend_." Both Nathan and Audrey turned and looked uneasily at him for that. "And he just got _used_ by some dick holding people's Troubles hostage for the benefit of his libido--"

"That's it." Nathan swung around on Duke. "Get out. I'm not listening to this. Like I don't know what I'm doing? Can't make my own choices? I knew what he wanted! I wanted, too. An exchange. If that's what you think, stay the hell away from me."

In the background, Audrey sighed, but Nathan's glower was relentless. Duke shifted and repeated, in protest, "But you can _feel_ right--"

"The last thing I _want_ to be feeling," Nathan snapped, "is _you_. Out of the truck, Duke!"

Duke could see he meant it, and so even though he intensely didn't want to, he disembarked. "Nathan..." He spread his hands in entreaty. "Look, I'm sorry. I didn't mean it like that."

Nathan curled his arm behind him through the open window to catch the back door and slam it shut, a move that pretty adequately demonstrated he could feel what his limbs were doing right now. He twisted his hand back inside with him, and with a last glare, left Duke in the dust. Audrey sent him back a shrug and a twist of her face that seemed to indicate it was Duke's own fault. 

Duke cursed as the Bronco disappeared around a corner and he kicked the low wall around the twee, flower-covered cottage garden of the B&B where that bastard had just had meaningless sex with Nathan.

Something told him to look up. Magic Mark was looking out of one of the upstairs windows at him. Duke glared at first, then gestured irritably with his hand for the guy to come down.

A moment later, the main door of the guest house opened and he emerged with his clothes a bit hurriedly thrown on and lighting a cigarette even as he stepped out from under the porch. The smell of the cigarette didn't hide the smell of sex -- of sex and _Nathan_ \-- as he closed in with Duke, though the small wall was between them.

Duke leaned on the wall. "First off, don't bother offering to have sex with _me_."

Mark sniffed. "You're not Troubled. Or..." He sniffed again, harder. "Or it hasn't been activated yet. But I don't think it'd be a good idea, anyway."

Duke _did not_ like the sound of that, but he suppressed his shudder of unease. No way. Troubles were familial. Simon hadn't had one, had he? His mum definitely hadn't, unless it'd been a gin Trouble. He shook it off and tried not to let it distract him; figured that was probably what the guy was _trying_ to do. 

"Did you _enjoy_ Nathan, huh?" Duke could see the fucker _had_. "Well, better cherish that memory, because _second_ , I think you're scum, I think what you're doing is reprehensible, I _know_ you're up to no good with this somehow, and I absolutely intend to take you _down_."

"Hah." The guy laughed. Cheerful bastard. "He said much the same thing before he left, actually. Politer. But you know what else? He left.. _thoroughly_... _satisfied_." 

Mark made a real _meal_ of rolling those polysyllables around in his mouth.

Duke's lunge at him was foiled by the wall and Mark dancing backward out of reach. He thought about hopping the damn wall, but the B&B's stern owner was looking out of the kitchen to see what was going on. Duke did not think it would improve Detective Wuornos' chances of ever talking to him civilly again to have to come back here to deal with a public disturbance. Even as much as he really, really _wanted_ to punch the sleaze, he wanted to fix things with Nathan more.

"Sure." Duke backed off. "You gloat. But I meant what I said." He walked away slowly, backward, keeping Mark in sight.

As soon as he'd left the sleaze's sight, he cut around the back of the house to check the B&B records for the guy's full name and financial details while Mark was smoking and the owner was spying. He'd call his contacts, and if Mark _had_ been up to no good -- any no good at all, even down to a _parking ticket_ \-- Duke was going to find out.

***

It would be a pity to let anger with Duke to ruin the limited time he had with the capacity to feel. Hell, Nathan had known what Duke was going to be like about it, he'd _known_ the comments would be coming. His bad luck that Audrey had pulled Duke along on their investigation this particular day.

"Maybe you should, you know, take a sick day," Audrey said. "I can cover for you with the Chief. You should make the most of it. Take a hot bath. Go for a walk in the sun. Go get a massage... I mean, I guess you paid for this time, after all."

Nathan frowned at her. "That's how you're thinking of this? Like... prostitution?"

Audrey winced, but stood firm. "Well, it does kind of fit the definition. Sex for services rendered, after all."

"It's not--" Nathan shook his head, frustrated. "I don't _have_ anyone, Parker. Jess left, and -- It might as well have been with him. I don't have anyone."

She sighed and looked sad for him, and touched his chin with a touch that he'd have felt either way. Odd, for there to be nothing magical about her touch. "I see. I'm sorry. But, hey, look up, you got laid, and depending what the hell he's actually up to here in town, we might still get to arrest him later."

Nathan pulled a face. He got to feel that, too, his skin skewing into different, contorted shapes. Weird. "Shouldn't have done it. It's an investigation. Even if a Troubled, off the records, investigation." 

"Well, on the bright side, you didn't _just_ compromise it, you also found us information." She smiled. "Legitimately, Nathan, you can slope off. Make the most of it."

"It doesn't really matter where I am and what I'm doing, now. Besides..." He checked his watch. "It's not much more than half an hour, no real time to do anything."

They shelved the conversation for another five minutes while they were in the sandwich shop. When they came back out, Audrey said, "So was it worth it? Was it blindingly good hot man-on-man action?" The twinkle in her eye was as mischievous as Duke's, but in her case he knew the question to be well meant.

He nodded, and ran his mind back over it, imagining the replay over his body of Mark's mouth, Mark's fingers, Mark's cock. "It was good." He quirked his mouth in a harder sort of smile and admitted, "although it left me sore, and right now, I can feel that, too."

A grin showed her teeth, venturing out slowly, and she laughed at him and gave his arm a quick squeeze. "Seriously, partner, I didn't know that was what you liked. Well, I'd wondered, early on, but not after Jess."

"You'd wondered--?" Nathan felt his forehead crease in consternation.

"You never seemed to notice the women hurling themselves at you. Not even Jess, at first. So I wondered."

"...Huh." Nathan shook his head. "Well, maybe I am gay. Think I liked it too much _not_ to be, even if it was also the only thing I'd felt--" He wavered a moment over the lie "--in a really long time."

"Bisexuality is a thing, Nathan," Parker said. "It's okay. Although I think _Duke_ might be interested, if you told him what you just told me."

Nathan snorted. "Not gonna add propositioning _Duke_ to the crap he already gives me." New ammunition wasn't exactly short after today already.

"Nathan, there's a vibe. I'm getting a vibe off him. You should tell him." She shrugged and held up the packages she'd carried out of the bakery. "Sandwiches are getting cold. I think you wanted to enjoy hot food and crispy bread with textures?" 

They sat on the edges of their seats to eat, doors open, facing outwards into the world in opposite directions. A bacon sandwich had never tasted so good. Afterward, Nathan leaned back in the sun, stretching his legs out and curling his hands on the frame of the Bronco, shifting his fingers every so often to chase the sensation of heat from the hot metal warmed by the sun. It was a while before he realised Parker had finished too and was watching him quietly.

"Ten minutes," she said. "Last chance. Is there anything you want to do?"

"I want," Nathan said, eying the park and the grassy slope mere feet away from their parking spot that led up to the bandstand, "to take off my shirt and go roll in the grass."

She laughed in disbelief, and then whooped in even more disbelief as he got up, and started racing in long strides for the longer grass halfway up the slope, under the line of trees, stripping his jacket and shirt off and tossing them on the grass behind him as he went. After all, he'd already slept with a stranger today to indulge his deprived body's wants. By comparison, this display was nothing.

The grass tickled the skin of his chest as he rolled, and droplets of dew that had survived the morning in the shade licked cool damp trails across his skin, and Parker _whumped_ down beside him to join in, though all she'd taken off was her jacket. 

Nathan groaned and pushed his face into the grass, brushing an insect away from his nose. He stilled and just lay there. It was wonderful.

After a moment, he rolled over to face Parker, similarly stretched out and grinning at him. "Oh, Detective Wuornos, your needs are so _sordid_ ," she scolded him.

Nathan let out a long breath. "I don't care what Mark is. I don't care what Duke thinks. It was worth it."

It was going away. The timing was only approximate, Mark had said. 

Then Audrey put her hand on his chest -- his bare chest -- and he stiffened, as it was still as bright and clear as everything else had been, just moments ago.

"Don't--" he breathed, urgently. "Don't touch me, Parker."

She sprung her hand back as if burned. "What? Why? Has it started hurting? Has something gone wrong?" She pushed onto her elbows, getting up.

He shook his head at her quick change of mode. "No, it's nothing like that. It's just -- it's going away. But I can feel you. I've known since that day Jess left, when you kissed me. I didn't want to confuse things between us, but... I think that maybe that's your Trouble?" He looked at her uncertainly, guiltily, and wondered if he should have told her sooner, or if this was the right moment at all.

"What? That I'm like _Mark_?" she asked.

Nathan sat up. The last threads of sensation were in the process of fading, but no longer the most important factor in this scene. "Not like Mark. It's only _when_ you touch me. Unaffected by other Troubles, maybe."

"Oh." She sat back on her heels. 

Nathan's bare-chested state was drawing a few stares, but he didn't want to move away yet. 

"...And you didn't tell me?"

He shook his head, hating that she sounded hurt. "Didn't know how. Didn't understand it. Waiting for the moment. I... _don't_ want it to complicate things, Parker. I don't want to get hung up on... Wouldn't want to use you like that."

Her breath dragged in audibly and caught. "But you could use _Mark_."

He grunted. "Had to get it out of my system. It's out. Just... try not to touch me unless it's life and death. We can manage this."

"You're such a dark horse, Wuornos." Parker climbed to her feet and aborted a reach down of a hand to help him up, shaking her head slowly. "Come on, let's get you dressed. The old ladies' gossip club in the knit shop think they're getting a show."

Nathan probably blushed as he automatically looked that way and met a dozen pairs of interested old-lady eyes through the window glass. Audrey handed him his shirt. He pulled it on and struggled to fasten the buttons with fingers that were numb once again. She handed him his jacket and he tucked it under his arm as they walked, then slung it on the back seat of the open Bronco.

"So, you're all back to normal, now?" Parker asked.

Nathan nodded. "Are you okay?" 

She tipped her head. "I... didn't expect to be a _part_ of this, like that. To be Troubled... I mean, I _came_ to this town... I suppose there was something strange going on here right from the start. With Lucy... I think we all knew... we talk about her like she could be my mother, but she looks _exactly_ like me."

"Maybe you're something else," Nathan suggested hoarsely. 

"Yeah, it's going to take some getting used to." She shook it off. "But hey, I'm okay. We should probably get back to the station. Though I _am_ sure we're not short-changing HPD, considering how much unpaid overtime we must have racked up by now."

***

Duke had decided, hell with Nathan, he was going to do this, and get back in Nathan's face while he did. That plan in mind, Nathan's office seemed the logical destination to catch up with his wayward cops. Considering they'd been headed back to the station when they'd kicked him out, and it had taken him fifteen minutes to find someone else to bum a lift off of, that they decided not to be there just seemed downright inconsiderate.

He hoped nothing had gone wrong.

After about ten minutes, he got tired of hiding in Nathan's office and went to hang around the very quiet dispatch room with Laverne, and Stan, who also seemed bereft of anything to do today.

Another ten minutes of genial patter, and Laverne took a call and drawlingly passed on the message to a patrol already on the road, "Streaker in town over by the bandstand, Jerry." She rapidly took another call, rolled her eyes, and belled Jerry's car back with amusement. "Scratch that, it's only Nathan and he didn't take his pants off. Some people are way too sensitive."

"Not Nathan Wuornos?" Duke asked as she finished. He was floored by the confirmation in her face. "Our Nathan -- I mean, your Nathan? Chief's son. Kind of a prude. Took off his shirt?"

Laverne shrugged and returned him a judging look.

"The joys of spring?" Stan suggested. "It's the nicest day in a while. Even Nathan has a lighter side, Duke. A guy has to give in to indulgence every once in a while."

\--Okay, and wow, Duke had to struggle not to choke at that. "I don't think we even know the same person," he said accusingly. "He's on duty, for a start."

The cops shrugged but neither of them seemed to think overmuch of such an out-of-character act from Nathan or one of HPD's staunch ranks. Which did, Duke felt, kind of say something about this town.

It took Laverne a while to raise Nathan and Audrey on the radio, but when she did Duke could hear the blush in Nathan's voice. "Just a... momentary impulse. Don't know what came over me."

"Maybe it was a few heady fumes left over from a 'gas leak' somewhere," Audrey's voice sing-songed slyly in the background, and Duke held in a snort.

"We're on our way back, now," Nathan said gruffly.

"But Nathan, hon," Laverne said, with a certain wheedling tone. "Are you wearing your shirt?" She cut the communication, looking wildly entertained.

"He will be, won't he?" Stan asked in alarm.

Any other day, Duke's vote would have been to lose the shirt, but after this morning, he didn't want to think about Nathan divested of the protective layer of his clothing. Fortunately, when he finally strode through the door, Nathan was fully dressed. There was a nervous hitch in his step for his reported antics as he looked anxiously around, but the fact he was no longer walking like he'd had enthusiastic anal sex indicated his Trouble was back.

His eyes turned all the more nervous and guarded when he saw Duke, and his pace quickened. "When I said get out of the car, did I also say follow us to the police station?" he snapped, or... half-shouted, honestly, poking a hard finger into Duke's chest and knocking him back a step.

"Jeeze, Nathan, I'm sorry." Duke grabbed his shoulders for balance without really thinking that through. "If I implied -- okay, you got what you want out of the guy. Okay, you're good. You're fine. But I do not like the guy and I would really, really like to help you take him down. More than anything."

"Jealous," Audrey mouthed. She was standing behind Nathan, where she could do that with impunity.

Less subtle when complemented with Duke's far too quick-shot response of, "I am not jealous!" Even as he was catching up to what he'd just said, aloud, he saw Nathan's face twist in incredulity. His hands were still on Nathan's shoulders, really close to the slice of skin visible at his neck, really close to an embrace, and if Nathan hadn't knocked them off yet that was probably down to startlement at everything that was happening and all the other close touching he'd done that morning. "Okay--" Deep breath, but Nathan had fucked a guy already today, so it wasn't like it wasn't worth putting the idea out there again. "Maybe I am a little bit jealous."

"You've got to be kidding," Nathan said, and broke the hold. He surged past Duke into his office. But he wasn't kicking Duke out of the station. Could that be hailed as a small victory?

Nor was Audrey, though she hissed, "What are you playing at?" as she passed him, following Nathan.

"I have information," Duke said. "I'm of value for more than my charm. Which Nathan seems impervious to."

"Why are you here, Duke?" Nathan asked, already flopping into his chair as Duke was entering the office. There was a looseness in his body that hadn't been there for a long time. Duke could, looking at him, just about believe that he'd stripped off and run in the open air, just for the joy of it, exposing his body to the delights of the sunshine and spring breeze... right before the last of his borrowed time ran down. Duke winced as he figured out the timing.

"I'm here because however you feel about Magic Mark and this morning's 'liaison'--"

"If you airquote, I will shoot you," Nathan said, and Duke guiltily retracted his fingers.

"--However you feel about Magic Mark and his Magic Trouble-Healing Cock--"

Nathan gave him a dangerous look.

"--I personally will do anything to see him behind bars. Does that... I don't know, infringe upon the sanctity of your choice and consent, or is that okay?"

Audrey frowned at him, but Nathan said, a bit reluctantly but only apparently about admitting it, "Okay. I think he stinks, too."

"...Huh." Duke's lips parted and Nathan shot him a warning look. But Duke was already picking up loud and clear that Nathan's take on it of 'I don't care if he used me because I used him' was not to be questioned. "Okay, well, again, there's a good reason for that. His birth name is Mark Cricknall and he's a con artist. I know a guy -- do not ask for details, please, and let's just pretend I am not telling you this in a police station -- who says that last year Mark was a quadruple amputee taking some big-ass company for a payout."

"I guess he got better," Audrey said, shaking her head in confusion. "What the hell are we looking at here?"

"Everyone knows Scottie Carson's limbs fell off," Nathan muttered. "He'd have a reason to go for Mark's deal."

Audrey stared at him. "His limbs fell--? Everyone knows this?"

"Not the only one in town with a 'weird medical condition'," he said defensively. "So maybe Mark's Trouble doesn't just nullify Troubles, but... stores them? And can spit them out again later?"

"I don't know," Duke said. "I didn't know about Carson's Trouble. But this seems hella suspicious to me."

"It would explain why he does this," Audrey said. "Why he does the stuff that doesn't involve sex with all his, uh, younger and buffer marks." She shot a glance of wary apology at Nathan. "And why he goes for the more debilitatingly Troubled. I think we all understood loud and clear that he's not doing it altruistically."

"No-one we spoke to had seen him before last week, but doesn't mean it's the first time he's dropped into town," Nathan said, and asked Duke. "Your guy have an address for him?"

"It was in Bangor. I dialled the phone number attached to it and got someone else - he's not there any more."

"Maybe he moves around looking for people to fleece, but every so often has to come back to recharge on Troubles. Wonder what he's planning to use yours for?" Audrey popped Nathan gently on the arm with her knuckles. "Not that there aren't plenty of things not feeling anything might be useful for other than a medical claim. Maybe he's got yours for insurance if the people he's fleeced catch up to him."

Duke thought there seemed to be something a bit off, or at least odd, between them for an instant. Nathan dissolved it with a rueful smile. "I didn't know at the time he could use it like that, but I'm not going to start regretting I did it now."

"If you get a couple of hours, what does he get?" Duke posed. "If he... sucks all the Trouble out of you..." He grinned as Nathan winced at the emphasis on that word, and oh, there were still plenty of ways he could, ahem, milk this. "And that leaves you dry for an hour or two, how long does it last him?"

Audrey shrugged. "Troubles aren't an exact science."

"--or any kind of science," Nathan said, like he objected strenuously to that point.

"It has to be more than a couple of hours if he used it on the amputee claim," Duke said. "Assuming this theory is correct."

"Anyway, this one's a weird one, so I think we should check with the Teagues and see if their archives can offer us anything on this. Things like appearing and disappearing afflictions, one person displaying multiple different Troubles, and the like?" Audrey suggested.

"Sure," Nathan said. "Let's do that."

They both looked at Duke. "Oh, come on!" he groaned. "I apologised. Twice."

Nathan made a point of taking a bathroom break on the way out, which was sort of weird because Duke was hazily aware that he scheduled those at specific times because of his Trouble and -- oh. Probably he was just double checking the repercussions of anal sex on his body, since he couldn't feel what was going on down there.

"Something wrong?" Audrey asked, narrow-eyed. "You've gone really red in the face."

Duke slid his eyes vaguely in the direction of the men's bathroom door and pointedly away from it. 

She slapped his arm hard. "Duke, if you're thinking about the details of Nathan's bathroom breaks, you need to tell him how you feel."

Duke choked. "Now, there's a piece of relationship advice."

"I'm not trying to be funny. You have a thing! You need to tell him. If you tell him, perhaps he won't need to sleep with any more scheming asshats because they can make him drunk on their touch!"

"Nathan doesn't want me. The offer's there, it's been there a dozen times. More--"

"Nathan is physically incapable of noticing when he's being hit on short of someone actually saying, 'If you have sex with me you'll feel it and get a Trouble free hour or two in the bargain'. You didn't notice that?"

Duke had sort of noticed that. "You heard him earlier. He doesn't believe me. He knows how much I hated him going with that guy, but he doesn't believe I want him."

"Hah!" Audrey pumped the air, although both that and her exclamation were kept relatively subdued. "You said it."

"I swear, you're almost as bad as he is." Duke shook his head. "Why the hell am I collecting socially moronic cops?"

"Leave her alone, Duke," Nathan said wearily as he came out of the restroom. "She's the one who keeps pulling my arm to let you come on these ride-alongs."

***

The Teagues were interested and weird, though that could be a relevant description for them at any particular moment in time. 

Vince made an opening greeting of, humiliatingly, "Ooh! We heard Nathan stripped off in public!" 

Dave followed up his brother with a sly, "Pity I wasn't around to cover that with my camera. How's about a re-run right now? You fancy being front page news, don't you, Nathan?" 

"Help us to move more issues off the stands," Vince rounded off.

Nathan ducked his gaze away and tried to level his voice as he grunted a weak reprimand of, "Guys," and was grateful they didn't know the half of it.

The brothers oohed and ahhed some more when Audrey revealed what they'd come for. "The Cricknells, indeed. _Distantly_ related to the Crocker line, don't you know? Hm? _Hm?_ " They gave lots of nods and meaningful glances toward Duke.

Nathan said impatiently, "Well, he _is_ a criminal. Runs in the family."

"Well, let's see" Vince mused, frowning at his screen as he finally settled down to business. "I've _definitely_ got something on his father. Here you go." He turned the screen around. 

The old article on screen read, ' _Local Preacher Claims to Cure the Cursed of their Ailments_ '. That was pretty bald to make it into the _Herald_ , but apparently the Teagues had figured that with the Biblical associations, it could slip through.

"He was a _preacher_?" Nathan's brain bugged a bit as his memory replayed some of the x-rated moments from his morning.

"How'd he do it?" Audrey asked.

Dave's face scrunched. "Well, I don't much fancy that. Says here he drank the urine of the penitents. And they his."

Nathan groaned. "I knew that'd come into this somewhere."

"...Shit, I was hoping at least there were no watersports involved."

Nathan furiously waved Duke silent. "When I asked Mark about -- never _mind_." He chewed the off the end of his half hissed words. Encouraging Duke _and_ risking enlightening the Teagues as to his recent activities was far too much a risk if he pursued that line. 

"But the curses all came back," Audrey said, bent close over Dave and Vince's shoulders to read the screen, blonde head bright between their greying ones. "He got run out of town."

"Kept all the donations, mind you, and somehow ended up in Arkansas living as a millionaire -- though whether the miracle preacher con can have made him _that_ rich from Haven alone--" Vince broke off and hooted with truly dirty old-man laughter, "Dave, maybe you should try it! Might be you've found that new vocation could finally hit the big money."

"I'm drinking nobody's piss," Dave said grimly. 

"Mark uses blood or... other bodily fluids," Nathan grimaced as the Teagues looked ever so intrigued, and flattened his expression and hoped they wouldn't pry as to how he knew that.

"His family have probably been doing this for generations," Duke said. "Scam after scam. Can you google anything more about that guy in Arkansas?"

Vince shrugged and took his screen back. "Yup, like I said. Who says the old memory's failing? Sharp as a whip. Got to live it up with his millions, but not for long. Died in 1963 of a syphilis-related condition." He waggled his bushy eyebrows with gleeful scandal.

Duke coughed and pounded Nathan's shoulder with his fist. " _Man_ , you'd better hope his son was clean."

Nathan glared.

"What was that?" asked Dave, perking up.

"It's not important." Audrey rode over them quickly. "What _is_ , is that this Mark Cricknell is in town 'collecting' Troubles, the same as his ancestor did. We... _think_ that he can pull them out again, and use them himself somehow."

"He a preacher, too?" Dave asked.

"No, just a total dick," Duke said. 

"He's making people an offer," Nathan said uncomfortably. "To take away their Troubles for a short time. He's up-front that it's temporary. There's, well, nothing _illegal_ in what he's doing, per se..."

Duke forced another cough with the word 'solicitation' well-buried within it and Nathan deliberately stood on his foot and ground down hard.

" _But_ , we are wondering what he's collecting Troubles for," Audrey picked up. She toed Nathan's ankle surreptitiously, trying to pry him off Duke's foot while Duke made silent suffering gesticulations. "We know he's pulled a con that could only have been done using a borrowed Trouble, so we think there's a good chance he's up to no good."

"Ohhhh, that's interesting," Vince said. "They _are_ related to the Crockers, I said that." He looked around the three of them as if testing something out, then pressed his lips together and cleared his throat, a muffled rumble. "What I mean to say is, it could be incredibly _useful_. He'd be able to shut a dangerous Trouble off for long enough to take down the person affected."

Dave was nodding, though the glances he and his brother exchanged were cagey enough to spark Nathan's suspicions. "And if he controls when he lets it out..."

"Guys, he's not fixing to be helpful fighting the Troubles," Audrey said. "He's a slimeball strictly out for his own ends."

Nathan looked at her, startled. He hadn't realised she'd felt so strongly about it. 

"What she said," Duke echoed.

"I heard the part where he's a _cousin_ ," Nathan said, pointedly, and took satisfaction from Duke's affront.

"That's too bad," Dave said. A hitch in his voice and low sound, muffled, had Nathan realise that some kicking was going on under the desk, and he wondered what the old newspapermen were so furtively fighting about.

"...Well," Audrey said slowly, and he thought she'd noticed too, "what do you say we find him and we pick him up for questioning, now that we know better what kinds of questions we're asking?" She looked at Nathan. "Are you all right with that?"

Nathan, off-guard, had to subdue panic before he could muster a swift farewell to the Teagues and set a hand on Audrey's shoulder to guide her toward the door. " _Parker_. I'm fine," he mumbled as they went, "I don't have an emotional relationship with the guy, I can do my job."

"Just a relationship with his--" Duke muttered from close behind. Nathan gave in to temptation and stopped moving suddenly enough to accidentally plant his elbow in Duke's stomach.

"Oh, wow, I'm _sorry_ \--"

"--point taken," Duke wheezed.

The bell on the door accompanied their stumble out into the street.

***

They returned to the B&B only to find that Magic Mark had cleared out. Mallory Irving was fiercely disgruntled -- and amusingly enough, anyone would think that Nathan was the one who'd lit off without paying, the way she laid into him.

"Mrs Irving, please," Audrey cajoled, trying to interject reason into the tirade (though Duke would swear he caught amusement in her eyes, too). "I assure you, we'll do our best to find him."

"He's _your_ friend," Mallory scolded Nathan with a belligerent, waving finger that seemed to be all knuckles. "If he's keeping company with the police, I should be able to trust a man! What is this world coming to?" She narrowed her eyes upon Duke, over Audrey and Nathan's shoulders.

"He's _not_ my friend," Nathan said, exasperated. He half turned, following her gaze, and his face screwed up in distance as he swiftly swung back. "Neither's _Crocker_."

"Well, the two of you spent enough time up there talking!" Nathan reddened again, the by-now familiar panic sparking behind his eyes. "And _Crocker_ follows you around like an extra appendage. I remember the two of you when you were this high!" Her hand sketched the height of an imaginary child.

"Thanks, Mrs I.," Duke put in, inclining his head and doffing an equally imaginary hat. He grabbed Nathan's shoulder and pulled him backward out of the radius of the old woman's anger. "We'll go catch that miscreant for you now."

"Absolutely." Audrey grabbed Nathan's other shoulder and followed suit, forestalling his resistance against the rescue.

Nathan gave it a few steps before shouldering them off, covertly muttering, "Hope your mystery contact can contribute some bright ideas about how we can find Mark now, Duke. Last time a guest hopped out on Mallory without paying the bill, she was at the station demanding progress reports every morning for a month."

"Hah--" Audrey choked off her expulsion of laughter with a guilty glance behind them. 

They very quietly and quickly walked the rest of the way back to the Bronco. 

"We need to plan our next move," Audrey said. "If he's got all the Troubles he needs and has left town already--"

Then he wouldn't be their problem anymore, at least for a while, Duke thought. But he could hardly be happy about that outcome. 

The radio chirped as they were climbing back into the car. "Yep, Laverne." Nathan prompted.

"Seems someone else has caught that bad boy you're looking for. Place called the _Gun and Rose_ on the road outta town."

***

The situation awaiting them at the _Gun and Rose_ was _beautiful_ , and filled Duke with a heady, spiritual glow and the new absolute certainty that karmic justice existed in the world. Magic Mark had tried to proposition someone else with the offer he'd given Nathan. Someone else, by the name of Jordan McKee, had not been nearly so inclined to take up the offer. Rather, she had grabbed Mark by the balls and made a show of systematically reducing him to a writhing mass of pain on the floor.

Duke was, however, a little disappointed that Mark was no longer still actively writhing in pain by the time they arrived. 

"Why'd you stop?" Audrey asked, eyebrow quirking. 

She _so_ clearly wanted him to suffer, too.

"My Trouble stopped working on him a while ago." Jordan wore a lot of black and a few discrete spikes and one really mean glare. "Fortunately I also keep this behind the bar." She hefted a rifle.

"I thought he was supposed to be immune..." Duke kept a wise distance from the woman. 

"He needs-- um," Nathan cleared his throat. "An exchange. Blood and fluids, remember. If her Trouble is based on touch..." 

Jordan nodded jerkily. 

"Guess he bit off more than he could chew, this time," Audrey said, with uncompromising cheer.

Jordan was looking at each of them in turn, then fixed on Duke, far more freaked out than seemed justified from a woman who'd reduced a man to agonised screams with just her skin. "You're the Crocker... And you're the cops who know about the Troubles." She rallied and demanded, in a stronger tone, "You're taking his goddamn flash asshole car away with you, right? We don't have space for it to sit in the lot indefinitely, and we're not taking responsibility if it gets vandalised or stolen."

Nathan nodded and pushed her gun down, moving it from its -- accidental? -- fix on Duke's midriff to the floor. "We'll take it from here. Where's his car?"

"Shiny blue Mercedes out back." Jordan jerked her head.

"I'll get it!" Audrey piped up keenly, in her enthusiasm perhaps not connecting how that left Nathan with Duke _and_ Magic Mark.

Nathan, though, rolled his eyes and sighed. "Fine." He forked a card from his pocket and pushed it at Jordan, careful to keep only his fingertips on the very corner of it, though Duke figured it had to be Nathan's Trouble Mark had utilized to escape torture via Ms McKee. Still, they could probably do without having that conversation. "I'll need a statement."

"Statement?" She laughed, mocking him. "You're kidding me. Fucking Troub--"

"Doesn't matter. We rework it for the official report, but I'll need a statement. Come down to the station when you can and ask for--" He cast a glance at Audrey. "Officer Parker." Nathan walked past Jordan McKee and hauled on Magic Mark's shoulder. "Come along. You're under arrest..." He started to rattle off Mark's rights.

" _She_ should be taken in, not me!" Mark started to complain as soon as he had a buffer between himself and Jordan, voice rising shrill over Nathan's arresting-officer spiel. "You know what I offered her, you--" Nathan gave him _such_ a dark look he silenced on the instant and it took him a moment to regroup. "You know I didn't do anything wrong! It was a fair offer! She's a fucking _psycho_ \--!"

Jordan McKee tossed a sarcastic wave and a bitter laugh after the beleaguered Mark, then pulled her glove back on to cover her to the wrist. 

The door of the _Gun and Rose_ shut behind them and Duke let out his breath.. "Okay. That woman scares me a lot." Nathan snorted a laugh. He put Mark in cuffs, then into the back of the Bronco. 

A horn pipped at them and they turned to watch Audrey pull out of the lot at the wheel of Mark's shiny dark blue Mercedes. Duke pointed after her. " _That's_ not fair."

"No," Nathan agreed. "Leaves me you."

"Now, now. Be nice."

Duke moved away to get into the front passenger seat and was stopped short when Nathan grabbed his arm. "Duke. What she said -- and what Vince and Dave earlier. People get weird when they mention your family in connection with the Troubles. I think there's something there."

"Yeah..." He shuffled his feet and jabbed his chin vaguely toward Magic Mark before tucking it down against his chest. "He said something else earlier, you weren't there for that one. I've never..." He paused. Didn't really want to put the question. "I've never _heard_ of anything, but... Do you think it can be true? My family's Troubled? Something bad. Something _big_."

"I don't know." Nathan's eyes crawled over Duke's face uneasily. "Do you?"

Duke managed to score actual skin on Nathan's hand, rubbing it experimentally before it left his shoulder and the unprecedented gesture of comfort. Midway through retracting it, Nathan hesitated. "I know it can't be an easy thought, but Audrey... it's not for me to tell, but we were wondering if she's Troubled in some way, too."

He might as well have said, _We're all in this_. Fuck, _Nathan Wuornos_ was trying to be _nice_ to him. Worse, Duke realised -- he was getting the pep talk because he'd always been so damn shitty to Nathan about _his_ Trouble in the past. Nathan was trying to offer comfort because he thought that Duke thought being Troubled was _just that terrible_.

"I don't have anything against the Troubled. Or _you_ , Nathan. I don't have anything against you." Saying it made it seem more possible.

Magic Mark was getting up to something in the back seat, because Nathan broke away and stuck his head through the door to gruffly order, " _You stop that_."

After that, Nathan was climbing in the truck, so Duke rounded it to get in the front seat.

"Come on, Nate," Mark was wheedling. "You took my deal, you know this isn't fair."

"Took your deal for my own reasons," Nathan says flatly. "Doesn't mean I approve of it. I got what I wanted -- satisfied customer. Means I'm as friendly as you're gonna get in this town, but that _ends_ the moment you tell anyone else what we did."

"Even if no-one is going to believe you anyway." Duke tried not to let his eyeballs bug at Nathan's words. "Because there's no way Nathan Wuornos would ever have sex with you. And everyone in town _knows that_."

Nathan cast him a bemused look.

"I won't tell," Mark said soberly. "I don't anyway, and your curse is the only thing that stopped that woman torturing me all the while we were waiting for the police to get there. She's fucking dangerous. Besides, you were _hot_ , man, I told you. I'd go again. It doesn't give me any more access to your abilities, the repeat visits, but you'd still feel it."

"Look away," Duke said, with force, contemplating murderous thoughts until Mark dragged his eyes away from Nathan's hotness and down to the floor.

"You're so weird today," was Nathan's -- disgusted? _exasperated_? -- comment, before he turned back to Mark. "What _does_ it give you? What are you going to do with it now, my Trouble?"

"Probably not a lot. Hey, truth! I can store them, but once I've started using it, it disappears after a few days, a week at most. I swear I _meant_ what I said. We can do the whole thing again in a week or--" He stopped and looked nervously at Duke.

"You've still got my Trouble 'on' right now?" Nathan asked, pointedly also looking at Duke.

Mark nodded. 

Shit. So there wasn't any point trying to pound on him anyway. Not unless Duke punched hard enough he'd still be hurting when Nathan's Trouble wore off.

...Though he was sure he could arrange that.

"This is so totally fucked up _weird_ , though," Mark said, turning over his hands and wrinkling his nose in judgement. "How do you even live like this?"

"Seems I haven't been," Nathan replied. "But I think I might be going to start."

***

Back at the station, Nathan found Parker in a state of excitement over a scruffy old notebook she'd found in Mark's car. While the battered thing wasn't _ancient_ , it looked like it heralded from the sixties or seventies, and a lot of the material in it gave the impression of having been copied straight-out from something before then -- same hand, same pen, different to the handwriting in the last few pages of the book.

"It's a list of _Troubles_ ," Parker said. "Probably a list his family have kept for generations. Do you know what this means? We can get there _first_ and make sure things don't _explode_. Or at least have a handy reference when they do explode. Look!"

Nathan took the book and read the page she'd been displaying. "McKee family -- debilitating pain upon physical touch. Must cover up skin to get by in normal life. Useful survival tool."

He flicked through a few more pages. _Caldwell -- weather control. Atkins -- talk to the animals; might not like what they say, though. Carson -- limbs fall off, handy cripple disguise._

"There's no Wuornos," Parker said. "But you and your curse are pretty well known about town today."

Nathan nodded and handed the book back to her. "You keeping it?"

"I think, in the circumstances, it's a reasonable confiscation. I'm going to interview him and see if there are any more connections we can make to confidence scams he might've pulled. I've already contacted the people in Bangor and they're sending a representative down. I'm pretty sure they'll prosecute." She tipped her head. "If you'd prefer not to be on hand for the interview, I can handle this alone."

He was opening his mouth to protest, _again_ , that he was fine, but then he caught a glint of something in Parker's eyes and realised she would much rather take care of this one _without_ the complication of her idiot partner, who'd slept with the suspect. He raised his hands and said, "Fine. You take it."

"It was pretty reckless, Wuornos."

"You don't need to tell me."

She tipped her head toward the observation window. "You can watch. But you don't have to. I really can take it from here, and you can draw a line under the whole thing."

"...Okay. I... guess I'll go wrap up some paperwork. We've enough to hold him?" he checked dubiously, something in him lagging reluctantly from the thought of walking away.

"Sure we do. I don't know if the Bangor company's lawyers will leave very much for us, to be honest. They sounded just _thrilled_ to hear we'd nailed him."

"Ah--" Nathan gulped at the double entendre, truly unsure if it she had intended it or not, and swiftly left her to it. He returned to his office. 

Duke was sprawled in his chair, ankles crossed on top of his desk. 

Nathan stopped in the doorway and sighed, pinching his nose, and wondered if there was any point continuing to ask Duke _why_ he was there when it seemed like he... _always_... was.

"Shut the door," said Duke, and somehow there was a tone to his voice that had Nathan doing just that.

"So tell me," Duke _purred_ , his voice a warm vibration as he got up and came around the desk, opting to perch on the near edge of it and face Nathan with his legs wide. "What did he do?" 

Nathan wavered at the question, unsure what this was. "He...?"

" _Mark_ , who else? I know he got your ass. He take you in his mouth? Did you take him in yours?"

This again. Angrily, Nathan walked up and grabbed Duke's collar. "Not discussing this with you. Out of my office, _now_."

Duke made a point of not moving. In the struggle to shift him off the desk, their bodies were brought uncomfortably close, Nathan's hands bunched in the front of Duke's jacket, Duke's hands on his shoulders and upper chest, their heads bent close together.

" _If I said you could do to me everything he did to you_ ," Duke whispered into his ear, " _would that make a difference_?"

Nathan took a step back, shocked. Duke slid off the desk with the movement -- Nathan still had hold of his collar -- and he almost ended up on the floor between Nathan's legs, which would have been graphically illustrative of his suggestion.

Resentment and rebellion shot through Nathan. This was just another way to get him to spill details. Duke hadn't meant it. Duke _never_ meant it. Overtures of friendship, of more. If he accepted the friendship, he got used -- a good luck charm against Coast Guard interference, a way to make parking tickets disappear. If he accepted the 'more', then his sexual preferences became an insult to add to Duke's repertoire. Not that he already had much of a leg to stand on about that, as things were now.

"You're forgetting," he growled. "I can't feel. So there's not much point doing anything, now."

"Don't _tell_ me that," Duke said, fiercely. "You dated _Jess_." Duke was still in his space, which was partly Nathan's fault because he still had hold of him, but he stopped just short of touching Nathan's face with his open palms. "I can prove to you there are plenty of things we can do even without physical sensation. I bet I can do it to you with my mouth without even touching you."

Nathan shifted uneasily, and although he _couldn't_ feel it, he kind of had to wonder if there was less space for movement in his pants than there had been when they'd started this conversation.

He leaned in to Duke's face, shifting the grip of both hands up to his collar. "His tongue in my ass," he said softly, searching Duke's face for reaction. "That was a new one on me."

" _Nice_ ," said Duke, breathlessly, and Nathan was fairly sure it wasn't sarcasm.

"You really want to go there?" Nathan asked, which was _all_ skepticism. "Even if Magic Mark got there first?" 

"...Yeah. Yeah, I absolutely do," Duke gasped, and made a clutch for Nathan's hands, his waist, his face. 

Nathan rolled his eyes and shoved him off. His ass landed on the edge of the desk again, knocking a few things flying.

" _Hey!_ " Duke snapped. "I bared my _soul_ , Nathan!"

Nathan squinted at him -- _what_? -- and said, shaking his head, incredulously, "I don't _want to_. I _used_ Mark. He was a stranger, he probably meant no good anyway, I figured it was _okay_ to use him. Still made me feel like crap. I'm not going to use you the same way when I see you _every day_."

Duke laughed. "Oh, you are so _precious_ ," he said, through grit teeth, in such a manner that made it both a compliment and the opposite of a compliment at the same time.

Nathan frowned at him.

"So don't use me. _Date_ me. Wine and dine me. Bring me _flowers_. Write me love poetry.... Whatever your way is, the Nathan Wuornos way, do it that way!"

Flicking a hand to wave him off, Nathan turned to reclaim his desk, bending to pick up the stapler and papers that had fallen on the floor.

"You don't even have a response to that?" Duke asked, in what seemed like a very small, desperate voice. "I should never have listened to Audrey, you are just so--"

Wait, that was _seriously_ supposed to be a genuine proposition? Nathan stopped and replayed the insult, half upside-down with his hand on the floor. _Maybe_ it could be read another way, but it still didn't compute. "You _want_ to... to _date_ me?"

No, he couldn't keep that curl of contempt out of his voice.

"Since we were about thirteen," Duke said, "and I wrote our names in little hearts in the back of my schoolbook, and you tore it up and threw it in the sea."

"You were mocking me." Nathan straightened up. Duke was _always_ mocking him.

"And I got into trouble -- the regular kind -- because the homework I had actually done for once, plus the rest of my work, was _in_ the book which you tore up and threw in the sea. You really are a dick, Nathan."

"You want love poetry?" Nathan quirked his mouth.

"...You focus on _that_? No! No, it's not essential! Only if you want to write it! However you want. I mean, we can do it however you want."

Nathan stood and stared, feeling lost. There was a lot more space between them now. Duke had retreated halfway across the office in response to what Nathan sort of had to admit had been a rejection, even if he'd not recognised it as one at the time he was doing it. He'd known Duke for so long that the push and pull of their relationship had fallen into routine, but it hadn't _always_ been bad.

Then again, whenever he did take a risk, Duke let him down.

But _really_ , if he was going to risk anew, if he was going to chance Duke once more, then surely on the day he'd already given his body over to a stranger, it was no great shakes. Stripped off in public, too, he remembered with a wince, and those in town who hadn't seen it probably knew about it by now. For all he knew, it might yet make it into the _Haven Herald_. For all he knew, someone had had their phone handy and it had already made it to _YouTube_.

"...All right," he sighed. "How do _you_ want to do it?"

Duke blinked like despite his protestations, his verbal acrobatics, he'd still never expected that answer at all. 

Nathan made a 'well, get on with it' gesture.

"Tonight," Duke said slowly, and swallowed hard. "The _Cape Rouge_. Dinner. No sleep-over, you get a taxi back. We start slow. I mean, I'm assuming _anyway_ that after three years of none, you'll have had enough sex for one day..."

" _Duke_ ," Nathan warned.

"Hey, I'm not ruling out some kissing and groping." Duke looked more uncertain, more lost and out on a limb, than Nathan had ever seen him.

Nathan felt about as clueless. His hands were at his sides. He couldn't figure out what to do with his body that didn't feel awkward. Not with Duke there, Duke's eyes on him. This was...

"This is _ridiculous_ ," he burst out, stepping forward. "We've known each other for _thirty years_."

Duke met him in the middle, and... so much for the evening, it looked like they were already at the kissing and groping stage.

The kiss was probably clumsy and it definitely rang with the clash of teeth. Nathan dragged his hands through Duke's hair and pushed his knee forward. He'd lost track of Duke's hands but would lay odds that wherever they were was infringing on x-rated territory.

They pulled back and dived in again, lips and tongues; _taste_. Nathan tried to watch the changes in Duke's face through the kiss. This time they pulled apart with a feeling of more success.

Nathan held Duke's jaw between his palms, eyes still locked upon his eyes. "The _Cape Rouge_ , tonight," he counter-offered. "And whatever happens, happens."

END


End file.
